SPACES WITHOUT TREAD MARKS It's just an idea, but we think it would be cool if a sports shoe company could develop a trainer which delivered or left behind a creative mark, tag, stamp, stencil, chalk mark, signature or logo, in order to document the places your feet have been, and the obstacles overcome in getting there. We don't know how you'd build them or make them print on cue, without leaving a trail of paint on your best carpet or making the soles too slippery to grip, but perhaps it could be triggered by the toes or a click of the heels, or a heavy downward pressure traumatizing a reservoir of ink, projecting it out through tiny porous holes in the rubber soles. It could be a coloured imprint of the shoes sole delivered on contact, a customisable block print of individual design punched onto the grounds surface, or it could just be a self-adhesive sticker laid by the shoe. This idea was inspired by watching the discipline of 'Le Parkour', or 'Free Running', and seeing the exploits of the founders of the movement Sebastiane Foucan and David Belle, who formed a teen-gang dedicated to it's practice called the 'Yamakasi' in a small suburb of Paris called Lisse in the early 90's. Reacting to their environment and the obstacles and fences created around them by the sprawl of urban city development, the Yamakazi broke free by creating a game which involved crossing every obstacle in their paths by running, leaping and jumping across them, using only their acrobatic skills and abilities, and no other equipment other than a decent pair of sports shoes. Like a martial art, the discipline requires both physical and mental agility: Free Runners don't view obstacles as walls blocking their progress; they see them as objects to bounce off and as new surfaces to leap from. In Free Running you only move past or across an obstacle in a forward direction, never backwards, anticipating the obstacles and challenges of the pathway ahead, and rising to the challenge by seeking out the components of an obstacle which might provide a stepping stone forward to the next. The amazing physical abilities of the Parkouriste's is inspirational to watch, but it is the way they view the world around them as a playground for their sport, throwing up implications that their practice redefines the uses of designed structures and space, which most singles out their discipline as being a new way of thinking. The philosophy behind Free Running is as relevant to the Free Runners using rooftops as springboards and climbing frames to explore the world from new perspectives, as they are to the new artists and designers emerging whose creative space and forward movement is limited and obstructed by the enduring grip of 20th century style. No matter how claustrophobic the designed world might appear, there is always a different perspective to be found, a way of using the things around us as apparatus for our own personal adventure. There is always a space somewhere without a tread mark. ------- Although we think it would be nice for Free Runners to have their own shoes for their own sport, specifically designed to aid the techniques they practice, the reasons why we think it would be good to have a sports shoe with the added functionality of leaving behind coloured imprints, is because it would change the way people use their feet. Not just athletes and hard-core Free Runners, but anybody who wants to raise their foot above ground level and mark the occasion. It would be an art tool for the foot. Further Reading: www.le-parkour.com www.channel4.com/jumplondon NOTE The shoes used on this page were re-designed by subverting Nike’s online 'build-it' function on their European website, and are shown here for illustrative purposes only. Visit their website to try it out for yourself: www.nike.com Text by Julian and Sophie